Destiny
by ILoveLegendsaLot
Summary: Zane is dead. And it's all Lloyd's fault.


(So I believe Lloyd would have been the one hit hardest by Zane's death. It's a mixture of big brother worship and guilt because stopping the Overlord was kinda supposed to be his job. This fic shows Lloyd's initial reaction to everything and how he viewed it from his eyes. I do not agree with what he thinks about himself here, but this story is told through his point of view.)

It had been a dull day.

Lloyd had woken up, eaten breakfast, completed his morning training, skipped lunch to go for an uneventful run, trained some more, then finished his evening training. He'd pushed himself, his muscles ached from the strain, but he felt like he hadn't accomplished anything. Hadn't improved.

Maybe part of it was that he was training alone. Training alone was harder than training with others in a lot of ways. Also less fun.

But he didn't deserve fun.

He'd been quiet during dinner, only talking to respond to his parents and his replies were short. Lloyd just hadn't had anything to talk about. On top of that, he'd been tired and sore. Not like there was anything wrong with being less chatty every once in a while. Avoiding eye contact had once again proved to be an effective strategy for evading conversation.

Lloyd hadn't missed the worried looks his parents had exchanged as he retreated to his room. He did feel a little guilty, but what was he supposed to do? He'd talk to them later.

After changing into his pajamas, he'd flopped on top of his bed, not yet ready to go to sleep, but unsure of what else to do.

Lloyd rolled over and stared at his bookcase, two-third books, one-third comics. After a few seconds he let out a sigh. He wasn't in the mood. His eyes slid over to his pile of videogames. …No. He rolled over in the opposite direction and looked over at his tv.

Unenthusiastically, Lloyd reached for the remote on his bedstand. There was probably something he could watch.

He flipped through the channels with no destination in mind. He passed over some cartoons, a nature documentary, a cooking show, some action movie. None of them really perked his interest so he kept going.

Then a familiar image flashed across the screen. Lloyd froze, his mind momentarily blanking as the last notes of the theme song played out.

With a start, Lloyd snapped out of his stupor, his finger racing to shut off the tv. He was a fraction of a second too slow though, and before the screen turned black, the green ninja saw a shot of Jay talking to some contestant.

Eyes still glued to the now dark screen, the blond let out a deep, shuddering breath.

His brothers had all left him.

He didn't blame them for it. He'd hate him too if he were in their shoes. He hated himself in his own shoes, so how could he expect them to feel any different?

It was his fault Zane was dead.

Lloyd's hand curled tighter around the remote, turning his knuckles white. How pathetic was he? He'd had everything going for him- a prophecy foretelling his victory, incredible powers, friends and family that supported him. All that and he'd only been able to keep the Overlord away for a year. Did that even count as a victory?

He must have done something wrong. There was something different he should have done or some power or ability he was supposed to have unlocked. His grandfather had locked the Overlord away for thousands of years. And his stupid, disappointment grandson could only manage one measly year.

If anyone should have died fighting the Overlord it should have been him. Not Zane. Zane hadn't deserved it. Lloyd was the failure. The Overlord was his responsibility.

The others were completely justified in their hatred for their failure little brother. The only one he'd seen in over a month was Nya and he couldn't fathom why she acted so normal around him. She had to hate him too, they all knew the Overlord's return was his fault. He hadn't done it right. He'd screwed it up somehow. He wasn't sure how, but he must have screwed up _something_ because the Overlord had come back almost immediately.

Eyes watering as sadness and frustration swelled up inside him, Lloyd put the remote back on his bedstand. Curling up so his head rested on his knees, he stared out into space, not really seeing anything.

Not only had he utterly failed in defeating the Overlord, he'd gotten himself caught when the monster returned. If he had been smarter or better at controlling his powers or a better fighter, he wouldn't have gotten caught. If he hadn't gotten caught, the Overlord would have been destroyed when the system rebooted, but no, the Overlord had succeeded in syphoning off some of Lloyd's golden power so he'd _survived_.

Tears were falling freely down his face now, silent, but undeniable.

It should have been him.

Lloyd didn't believe in destiny, not fully. Yes, there were some things that couldn't be avoided or changed no matter how hard you tried. Yes, prophecies could foretell the what was coming, but could they truly force an event to occur? If Lloyd had chosen to abandon the ninja for his father or just runaway from all of it, things would have been different. Most likely horrible, but different. Choices still mattered. The only thing that could have truly stopped him was his conscience, but that was a hard thing to escape.

Despite his loathing of the burdens of destiny, there had been some level of comfort in knowing what came next. But now even that small comfort was cast into uncertainty. Destiny was far less advantageous if he couldn't understand it, could misinterpret it.

Destiny hadn't kept the Overlord away. Hadn't kept Zane from dying.

But now of that mattered now. It wasn't destiny's fault Zane was dead, it was his.

Lloyd's gaze fell onto the group photo hanging on his wall, the one they had taken a week after the Overlord's first defeat. They were all smiling. All alive. It had been a perfect ending. He'd even gotten his dad back, something that until then had only been a wild, desperate hope. If he'd just done it right, that ending could have continued. But he'd screwed up. Now Zane was dead, died doing what was supposed to be Lloyd's responsibility. His remaining siblings hated him. The only one who hadn't left him completely was Nya and that was probably mostly due to they were both helping out Cyrus Borg so they had to see each other. He'd lost a great deal of his powers because he'd proven himself incapable of handling them. He'd ruined his own happy ending, and worse, put Ninjago in danger leading Zane to sacrifice himself for his stupid little brother's mistakes.

Swiping his sleeve across his face to dry away some of the tears streaming down his face, he let out a quiet sob. And was immediately disgusted. He swiped out his face again, harder this time. Why was he curled up in bed crying like a loser? How was this helping anything?

Anger bubbled up from the pit of his stomach. He shouldn't be crying, he wasn't the victim. He was the failure. And sitting in his room crying himself to sleep wasn't going to make him any less of a failure. A failure had to learn from his mistakes and push himself so he wouldn't fail again.

He ran a distressed hand through his blond, disheveled hair and took a deep breath. This wasn't the time to be lying around.

Lloyd quickly got out of bed and changed into his sweats. Just a few more training exercises and he'd go to sleep. Yes, he was still sore and a little tired and could feel the beginning of a headache coming on, but he had to push past his limits if he wanted to become better. To become someone who could protect those he cared for. A few more exercises, and then he'd probably fall straight to sleep.

He needed to be better.

He owed it to Zane to be better.


End file.
